Return to Innocence
by Oneshadedarker
Summary: Is there such a thing as an afterlife? Axel can't help but think so when he reawakens to fragments of his past. Could it really be that simple to return to innocence? [slight AkuRoku] [AxelDemyx] [RoxasDemyx]


Hello everyone and welcome to my extremely long and probably boring one-shot. I'm new to this section and this is my first story for the Kingdom Hearts...so of course I began by writing for the Organization because, come on who hasn't? lol. This story is set after KH2 and was originally meant to be rather short but, when I go off on a tangeant hell hath no fury. I still hope, however, that each part, though it may seem trivial, adds to the overall message I tried to convey and will make this a story worth reading. If not then, I'm still strangely happy with it so I won't mind. -

This one-shot has been dedicated to my good friend and fellow author Nephthy-san who is a great authoress, inspiration and slave driver. Here's fufilling my promise of a one-shot. And if you have the attention span to get through it in one sitting then you really have no soul lol. (Rolling all around, rolling all around...love that song).

Disclaimer: I don't own Kingdom Hearts 1, 1/2 or 2 and thank God I don't because it would just be random and fragmented and sweaty...extremely sweaty and no female characters...yay!

* * *

_Return to Innocence-By Enigma _

That's not the beginning of the end  
That's the return to yourself  
The return to innocence.  
Love - devotion  
Feeling - emotion

Love - devotion  
Feeling - emotion

Don't be afraid to be weak  
Don't be too proud to be strong  
Just look into your heart my friend  
That will be the return to yourself  
The return to innocence

If you want, then start to laugh  
If you must, then start to cry  
Be yourself don't hide  
Just believe in destiny

Don't care what people say  
Just follow your own way  
Don't give up and use the chance  
To return to innocence

That's not the beginning of the end  
That's the return to yourself  
The return to innocence

Don't care what people say  
Follow just your own way  
Follow just your own way  
Don't give up, don't give up  
To return, to return to innocence.  
If you want then laugh  
If you must then cry  
Be yourself don't hide  
Just believe in destiny

Awareness was always the greatest of his sins. Awareness of others had been his devastation; awareness of himself had led to his treacheries. Awareness of emptiness, of gluttony and vanity and some other faceless damnations that he was sure tinted his blood as black as his tattoos; black ink silently crying where he could not. But it was that awareness he'd hoped to end the moment he chose to die. Yet the darkness he'd sought comfort in was no longer his silent sepulcher. There was only the conception of thought, the creation of consciousness. And there was peace…maybe that was why he felt so lost. For a Nobody, chaos was synonymous with existence, paranoia meant survival, and the inability to value beauty or perceive touch or discern morality from depravity…there was only cynicism and the anger that ran as thickly through his veins as the fire that haloed his hair and made him feel human if only for how it stopped the numbness.

But the numbness he felt now was different, without the cold hollowness that felt like a cavity rapidly filling with blood, asphyxiating him with the reminder that there was no heart **_to_** suffocate but enough hatred to make him outlive the pain for one more day. The numbness he felt was almost lethargic, a sluggish warmth that fastened his arms and legs to the ground in an assertion of gravity. Lazily he opened his eyes to stare at an endless sky, bleached of any defining color so that it was like staring at the blinding glare of glass, mute and devoid. He closed his eyes quickly, finding it uncomfortable to stare too long at the sight and settled into the familiar darkness that inexorably defined and defiled his existence. It felt nice, for once to simply let go and not have to constantly agonize about light and darkness or whether the words spoken were truly what was meant or simply his death sentence handed to him on petty parchment by a self deemed god.

"I wouldn't do that if I were you…this place seems to love to rip you apart when you stop resisting."

Instantly his eyes opened, turning from the disquieting vision of glaring white to the sight of a figure perched on a sanded down rock, the image distorted by the slender opal petals and supple green leaves of the flowers that harbored his body. '_A garden'_ he mused with some surprise, his hand gently lifting from the ground to probe at a flower near his nose, watching with detached interest as the petals shook and fell before scattering in a gentle breeze. His eyes met those of the figure, a man whose very aura reflected self assurance and danger, wearing a simple black business suit like a second skin and a predators smile like the game shark he was. He could feel the thin line of his mouth curl upward in an acidic smirk, knowing that, even in the end fate would somehow screw him over.

"Hey Dice, long time no see. Exploring your metro sexuality?" He asked, sitting up to slowly shake the lethargy with a few cracking bones and twisting muscles. He could feel those vivid blue eyes study him and silently checked if his limbs bore any odd heart/diamond/club/spade shaped markings…or if he had suddenly become a two inch dice…both were equally demeaning.

The sharp timbre of a chuckle filled the silence between them and he almost fell forward at the abnormal sound. He righted himself quickly, transfixed on the gamblers face which seemed to shatter from perfect impassiveness to mirth, the contours of his face apparent after a shared lifetime of wooden expressions and movements. He almost seemed approachable…mortal. And he was…laughing? Okay, now he knew where he was…

"I'm in hell right?…how anti-climactic. I was expecting fire and shrunken heads and souls screaming in agony…kind of like Castle Oblivion but without the monochrome that makes your eyes bleed." He knew he was ranting like an idiot but that was how he usually ascertained all his situations. Lower his enemies guard until he could establish whether there was an actual threat. And he definitely knew that Luxord was a threat.

"So, even death hasn't stripped you of your sense of humor huh Axel?" Luxord asked, giving the fire wielder a sidelong glance that seemed as attentive as it was predatory. Axel met the gaze with indifference, running his fingers through his hair out of resilient habit and to clear his mind. He'd never directly dealt with the self imposed "Gambler of Fate", having chosen the coarser path when it came to his dealings with the organization. Luxord was a tactician whose strategies were akin to playing a game, mostly of chance but always of skill. Luxord was behind the scenes and Axel had always chosen to fight in the front lines, if only to get away from Castle Oblivion and its monotony and hypocrisy. And even if he hadn't he doubted he would have been allowed to remain covert anyway. He was too hot headed and had enough enemies in the upper ranks to ensure they wanted him out of the way. We'll, they'd gotten their wish hadn't they? Too bad he'd taken them all with him…shame.

"Not if I want to stay two steps away from becoming Zexion." Axel responded with a rascals grin, much to the gamblers amusement.

"Of course." Luxord replied with sarcastic conviction, placing his hands behind him and leaning back until all he could see was endless oblivion. Axel raised a dubious eyebrow but the action was lost on the gambler who seemed content to stare at nothing but the sky. Axel was becoming agitated not to mention slightly unnerved by this newer, peace loving alter ego of the gambling tactician.

"Let's cut the bull Ten…" Axel whispered, his grin gone in place of narrowed turquoise eyes. When cyan eyes bore into his own and a finely arched eyebrow asked a silent question Axel continued. "Where are we and why are you suddenly acting like we're not trying to wipe each other off the face of the planet?"

Luxord broke their held gaze, succumbing to a silent chuckle that sounded more like a pointed exhale than amusement. "Not much for tact are you? Fine…we are in oblivion, our bodies returning to the same nothingness that gave them their dubious 'life'. And since we are now in this vacuum of nonexistence…"

"We've already been wiped off the face of the planet …oh joy." Axel commented with disdain, falling back against the grass and watching as a bed of petals rose into the air in protest. He huffed as one landed on his nose and quickly flicked it away because, tattoos be damned he was masculine damn it!

A thick silence impregnated the air between them, oppressing and alien in the aftermath of their meeting. Axel stared into the white void that veiled infinity, his thoughts scattering in different directions, more than he could keep track of. So he was in oblivion…somehow, he'd imagined it as a dark place, oppressive with a silence that was eternally wistful and damnably final. It would be a cruel dystopia filled with nothing but insensible obscurity and he would know nothing of it except the eternal echo of his last thoughts.

_'I don't want to die.'_

Ironic that his last words had been the antithesis of every battle, every word, and every breath he'd ever taken. But that fear had been human where he could not and he took small pleasure in its weakness because, regardless of what he wanted he'd died the day Axel was born and it was too late to pray for salvation.

But this place was nothing like what he'd imagined. An endless sea of flowers in a myriad of watercolors, a bleached canvas that took up the sky, the consciousness of movement, sound, thought, texture, awareness without pain. It was living or something grotesquely similar. And in a way it was nonexistence too.

So was this it then…was this heaven?

He almost laughed, blamed the instinct on a random wind that unleashed a hail of poppy seeds into his face and ignored the gamblers prying gaze with as much lucidity as possible. No, a filthy thing such as him, desecrated and sinful wouldn't be allowed into heaven. His birth had been an accident of nature, the catalyst of his destined self-destruction. No, this wasn't Heaven…but it wasn't Hell. So he did what he always did when he didn't know that upright was inverted and black was white except when it had sapphire eyes.

'_Things. Just. Are…get used to it.'_

And it felt like, for once, he was in control.

Axel cursed when a prominent black shoe dug into his side in a vicious kick, the breath stolen from his lungs as the ache pulsated through his body. He sat up with violent swiftness, glaring at the man above him with blatant distaste. Luxord met his gaze evenly and Axel noted the darker patterns in his eyes, the way in which they shifted from unperturbed to predatory. It was a gaze he'd seen often enough; from Marluxia ensnared in his own mad hatter games to Zexion whenever blood and essence was near…even himself whenever the fire reflected his eyes in the heat of battle. It was a challenge. Axel clicked his tongue in annoyance.

"You could have just asked you damned bastard." He growled, rubbing the sore spot above his ribs with a tenderness that defied his boorish nature.

"But where would the fun be in that?"

Luxord took his place adjacent from Axel, withdrawing a deck of cards from his breast pocket with practiced grace and bridging in mid-air like a dealer, the movements as rudimentary as the chakrams Axel uses as mediums in battle. Their time was spent within a repetitive loop of frustration and amusement; a perverse replica of normalcy and friendship. It would have been oddly comical if it wasn't so piteously tragic.

"Gin" Luxord murmured, tossing a string of spades, four to ten, between them. Wordlessly Axel threw his own deck atop the others, the spades lost among the disconcerting colors and patterns of his own hand. Just like that, it all seemed so pointless. But he kept on playing-and losing-so that in some inexplicable way everything would seem focused and deliberate even when it wasn't.

"They were here you know."

The sentence was fragmented enough that he didn't have to answer. He was tempted to simply throw that diminutive queen of spades in his hand into the fray of ornate cards and leave that as his answer. Luxord didn't push the subject, quietly observant even when his eyes traveled over his cards in impassive concentration. And Axel knew he would have to respond because the silence was Luxords way of metaphorically frustrating him until he snapped, even when his demeanor was that of quiet acceptance, maybe more so because of it.

In the end all he could do was sigh in aggravation, blowing a wisp of hot air from the side of his mouth in something that resembled a pout but not quiet that endearing and throwing his hand into the pile because he knew Luxord would win the hand regardless. "So, how were they? As charming company as me?"

Luxord grinned in a way that was both mischievous and reminiscent. He passed the deck to Axel who took it wordlessly, shuffling without the gamblers inherent skill but with enough animated movement that it was barely noticeable.

"Oh yes, quite charming…once they learned the power of silence."

Axel raised an inquiring eyebrow and knew, somehow, things would get interesting. "That bad?"

"It was interesting when the violence began but after turning a few of them into dice and leaving them alone for a while I think they started to get the message. Didn't mean things became easier but conversation with fully coherent sentences became commonplace."

Axel grinned, imagining the pure and utter chaos of bringing such contrary beings together. Marluxia, Larxene, Zexion, Xigbar, Saix and the rest…he almost shivered at the thought. All of them attempting coexistence had been hard enough within the Castle but boundaries of stone and marble had helped keep some semblance of order. But in this contradictory place that was like a three year olds delusion it must have been living hell. And he'd missed it. "Not fair." Axel murmured, contempt threading his voice as he glowered at the blond.

Luxard shrugged his shoulders in apathy, throwing the recently composed deck of cards in Axels lap. "Life's not fair…get over it and deal already."

Axel's luminous turquoise eyes told Luxord exactly what he thought of the gamblers opinion and the many violent venues Axel would take if he ever spoke so condescendingly again. Luxord smirked at how expressive Axel could be, even without words, one of the things that had attracted so much attention among the other organization members. It was simply impossible to ignore Axel, this bratty prince who had to have everything he wanted, regardless of the cost. It was dangerous to be so perceived and yet Axel, with his immense vanity and cunning had used it all to his advantage. Shame he hadn't been made a tactician. The man had a sharp mind when he actually thought things through. But maybe that was a saving grace within itself.

Axel's expression shifted to one of impassive elegance as he dealt new hand. His hands paused for a second, his eyes glossy in afterthought, a gaze that was oddly unbefitting for one as impulsive and devious as Axel. "Where are they anyway?"

"Left." Was the brusque response and nothing more.

Axel's eyes clouded slightly, a subtlety to the action that was not lost on him. It was a veiled reaction; the type that gamblers instinctively searched for in their opponents and Luxord had learned the importance of such proficiency, especially when dealing with such a mythical and perplexing creature as the key bearer and his beautifully mordant Nobody.

Axel shook his head, resuming his previous action with ease as if he'd never truly stopped. Each movement however is left to impulse, Axels mind too consumed with other thoughts to focus on such a seemingly mundane action. Left? Does that mean that there was a way to escape this place? But oblivion was forever. He'd died, as much as a Nobody _could_ die and he was here in this chasm that was the afterlife or a dream or a rupture in time or whatever other possibility made this oblong garden real. So how could the others have left?

His train of thought was violently derailed when something struck his back quite painfully, wrapping small, chubby arms around his neck and giggling quite annoyingly in his ear.

"What the hell!" Axel fumed, gazing over his shoulder to stare at a pair of diminutive azure eyes blinking owlishly beneath raven hair, a cherubic smile highlighting all the features and expressions that made him a child. Axel blinked once, staring at this seemingly fragile little thing that clung so affectionately to him and then turned toward Luxord, noting that more children were by the gamblers side. With a patience he didn't know he possessed he pointed toward the child over his shoulder, his voice stoic in an attempt at sanity.

"Luxord…what…_is_…this?"

Luxord briefly gazed over Axels shoulder, scrutinizing the child who waved back with generous affection, much to Axel's annoyance and Luxords amusement.

"It's a child."

Axel grits his teeth. "I _know_ that. I want to know _why_ it's touching me."

Luxord gave him a pragmatic grin. "Children tend to be attracted to other children."

Axel was tempted to make several rude hand gestures but restrained himself, feeling some sense of shame and decency and damn it, why did he suddenly have a conscience? This place was screwing with him, he was sure of it.

"Luxord, Luxord…we have to go!" One child commented, a boy of no more than four, maybe five years of age with dark silver hair and clear cyan eyes brimming with restlessness. He looked around worriedly as if the very ground were tempting to swallow him whole and, as if to stress this already apparent point, grabbed hold of the gamblers arm, pulling in a way that was comical and naive.

Luxord grasped the boy's hand, silencing his struggles with such a simple touch. Axel felt as if he were with someone else entirely, a casual friend he'd accidentally found after years of disconnection. Or maybe an enemy too much like himself to be called a friend. Regardless, it was too late to change the past. Maybes didn't get you anywhere and he was tired of presumptions.

_Lo que sera, sera_…or some crap like that.

"So, this mean you're dumping me?" Axel asked after an inadequately long silence, his nonchalance making the question preposterous. Luxord honestly wasn't sure whether to laugh or smack the pyromaniac. He chose the former, doubting the latter would have any effect. One smack would never be enough to shut Axel up.

"Only a separation…I think its better we see other people."

Axel scoffed. "You'll just come back. No one is better than me."

"You're probably right but…it's not about the destination or so the saying goes."

"Whatever."

And that was that. It was as much of a goodbye as either was willing to give and it was more than enough to satisfy the other. Luxord stood, stretching slightly before taking the boys hand, allowing himself to be lead away from the others.

"Yo!..." Axel called out, his hands grasping the cards they'd previously occupied themselves with and motioning for Luxord to take them back. The gambler shook his head.

"Keep them…you might be here for a while. Besides, your stupidity's probably all over them." Luxord ignored the tongue currently sticking out of Axel's mouth, turning but not before leaving the pyromaniac with one last thought.

"I once lived...not in the farce that was Organization XIII but as a real human with real dreams that reached farther than Castle Oblivion. I lived by the cards and the luck of the draw. But ultimately, like all luck, it runs out. And I didn't have the skill to save myself when my time came. I'd forgotten what it felt like to play a simple game of cards without the apprehension of survival. This place makes you remember what it feels like to be free of one nightmare and slave to another. And in the end, you realize we were all fooling ourselves…because even if we could go back to our past lives, the fragility of humans, their weakness…we would have detested it. And we would have yearned to be Nobodies again because power is corroding and destructive. Damned if we do and damned if we don't. We were condemned from the beginning." Luxord turned back toward the child, taking the boys diminutive hand in his larger one. "But for what it was worth…being a Nobody taught me how to forgive."

The pyromaniac's startled expression greatly amused Luxord though his face remained impassive, lost in the stupor of his own memories, both in the light and in the darkness. "It was only here, in this impartial place made of nothing and everything that I realized I never forgave myself for being weak, long before I became Luxord. But when I became a Nobody, all his shortcomings became beautiful because they were real and human, regardless of the weakness. I idealized him, as if he were someone else entirely, someone I've stared at through a looking glass. And in a way, he was…he still is. Everyone he'd ever hated and loved and hurt and cared for…I forgave them all because they were what made him human. I forgave him…and I've forgiven myself. And when you learn to forgive yourself Axel, you'll return to your innocence."

A sudden gust rushed by, raising a blanket of petals and leaves in its wake and obscuring Axel's vision. The obstruction only lasted a second by his count but when he lowered his arms, limp petals descending from their ineffective effort to blind him, Luxord and the child were gone, nothing but a memory of a black joker in a pile of colorful cards.

_'When you learn to forgive yourself Axel…you'll return to your innocence.'_

_'Innocence huh? Is there such a thing for someone like me?'_

"Hey mister?"

Axel flinched, his thoughts dissipating like the obscurity of a fog thanks to the high pitched voice speaking so closely to his ear. He'd forgotten about the little brats. _'Great, I get to baby-sit the little bastards.' _He sighed in exasperation, cursing his own dumb luck and Luxords atrocious timing.

"What is it?" He yawned, feeling vaguely somnolent and almost hypnotized by the monochrome flowers swathing around him. He felt a faint burn in his fingertips, a brush of warmth that pulsed in his hand and willed himself not to unleash a torrent of flame. As annoying as the flowers were they were still as flammable as they were inescapable and he wasn't looking forward to possible third degree burns. Oh yeah, and the kids…right.

"Can we braid your hair?"

Well, _that_ certainly woke him up.

* * *

Children…were so twisted. 

Of course, that conclusion may have been a little biased but, after what he has been forced to endure, he feels it is the least he is entitled to. Deranged mumbles and imaginative curses fill the air as the pyromaniac undoes the interwoven strands of scarlet hair and ribbons, never having realized a child could be so patiently elaborate at both braiding his hair _and_ taxing his patience. It was one of their less endearing traits.

The children have retreated to a random patch of flowers only a few feet away from him, picking lilies and poppies in an attempt at amusement. Axel can hear their lively chatter and his anger quickly succumbs to defeat. No point in irritation if the objects of your displeasure are rolling around in flowers and squealing in complete obliviousness.

There was a sudden shift in the ambience, a ripple of distortion that forced the flowers to bend and sway in compliance, the air to whisper into the nothingness of the sky. Axel tentatively gazed into the distance, hearing what he knew the children could not. His eyes traced the recognizable outline of a man, tall and lanky and definite even around the surrealism this place thrived on. Axel calmed the fire pulsing through his palm, a protest for his chakrams. No point in exerting himself, not for this fool.

"I knew Karma was a bitch but doesn't she have anyone else to screw over?" Axel groaned, resting his head in his palm. He could hear the meeting of material as the figure calmly walked forward, coming to a stop just before Axel. With languorous slowness he sat next to the pyromaniac and then there was nothing but silence, two synchronized breaths filling in the missing pieces.

"As much as I know I'm going to regret this later…And I _am_ going to regret this…" Axel sighed, succumbing to the inevitable- regardless of what exactly it was-with forced interest. "…Hello."

"…What's up with your hair? Lose a bet?"

"You always know how to kill civility don't you?"

"Excuse me but I'm a professional at killing everything, thank you very much."

Axel turned toward the other man, coming face to face with the incredibly irritating smile of the former Organizations number IX, the Melodious Nocturne Demyx. Unlike Luxord, Axel had a semblance of history with this member. Brief and opaque, it did not involve words or duty, just one night in which the external world balanced and his own world withered and faded like _his_ eyes had.

Axel's sardonic retort was cut off by the sudden pounce of the two forgotten children who, after realizing that a new member had joined their group and was in fact harmless, decided to treat him with the same warm, suffocating affection Axel was only too familiar with.

"Gah…Axel…what the…?" Demyx choked out, trying to avoid the small fingers currently grasping the lapels of his long sleeved turtleneck, its white color analogous to the flowers around them.

Axel's expression shifted to one of boredom, staring down at the pleading eyes of his former subordinate with disinterest. "Anything on the floor is fair game." It was as much of a consensual remark as it was a sardonic one and the children wasted no time in carrying it out to its fullest extent, later ambushing Axel when Demyx began to fight back with as much childish vigor as they seemed to be infinitely possessed of.

Time crept differently in this oblivion, maybe not at all. The sky would not alter its pallid pastel and the sun and moon did not exist. All that subsists was consciousness, beating strongly through the flowers, the air and their veins. After what he imagines was forever or maybe just a second the children have moved away again, rolling around like cubs near their mother, liberated and uncaring. Axel is lying on his back, his breath as labored as Demyx's, his pent up frustrations, anger, confusion spent and reaped. He was sure it was a similar experience for the Nocturne who appeared much more relaxed and unfastened.

"Geez…huff…don't they…huff…ever stop?" Demyx asked, his gaze on the boys who were still play fighting even after nameless hours of tiresome activity.

"Nope." Axel responded with a weary blink, his eyes following the Nocturnes and catching sight of the boy's hurdles and jumps, minds currently occupied with their own version of leap frog, a sporadic and animated adaptation to be sure.

A pregnant silence filled the gaps of their conversation, a time both used to recover exerted energy and derailed thought. For Axel it was a reflexive quietude, so dissimilar from the strained companionship he and Luxord briefly shared. It wasn't as if he wasn't wary of Demyx. On the contrary, he wanted to bury the man in the deepest perditions of flame, watch him scream in agony, despair, fear and feel completion in it, in knowing his hand had stroked the fading blood of each member and ended their meaningless lives by stealing every last breath. But with Demyx it was much more complicated, perhaps too complicated for a Nobody with a lacking heart and fictional soul. His debt to the Melodious Nocturne prevented him, had always prevented him from directly taking his life. The reason he both respected and loathed Demyx…a duality he was beginning to hate.

"You were asleep for a long time you know…I was starting to think you would never wake up. Even Luxord was growing restless."

Axel's gaze remained on the children, perhaps a bit too focused to be considered altogether observant. It was as much attention as Demyx was going to receive and he had to admit that he was thankful for it. Axel was vindictive with his eyes in a way even Xemnas couldn't replicate with his debasing words because, unlike Xemnas, there was fragmented emotion surrounding the irises of the pyromaniacs eyes, emotions that seared and burned like the fire he coveted. Like walking into the eye of the storm and even Demyx couldn't tame that tsunami.

"The others were here before you, myself included. But they found their way. Luxord came after, Xemnas was the last. But he never came here. I imagine it's because his heartless lived within the silver haired boy but it's simpler to say his heart corroded, along with everything else. I don't think Xemnas has enough pieces of himself for retribution. But they all came and left and you would sleep and dream. I guess you must have stayed in their world until the last battle, until you knew Roxas would be safe. It's just like you, to make sure to finish your mission, even after death. So like you…"

"Why did you play that night? Why did you awaken the Key of Destiny...?"

"The flowers are pretty huh?"

The interruption was unashamedly evasive, so abrupt that it silenced Axel in mid- sentence, no small feat in anyone's book. Demyx turned toward the pyromaniac, smiling unabashedly at the clearly bemused expression on the others face. He hummed a simple little rhyme as he began to indiscriminately pluck flowers from their earthen patches, poppy's Axel later realized.

"What _are_ you doing?" Axel asks, less from any actual interests and more because he has decided to play along with Demyx. The Nocturne wouldn't talk unless he chose to and to push is to lock yourself in a box without a key. So he will wait, knowing he is not one of patience's prodigal children but neither is he a fool.

"I'm picking flowers…what's it look like? You know, they say that if you scatter all of the seeds from a poppy in a single blow, your wish will come true. Come on Axel, make a wish!"

Axel scowled, feeling like he was being made a fool of. Demyx, with his childlike smile that radiated naivety, his eyes flecked with the water that pulsed through his veins, eyes that reflected the sky, earth and even the soul. That trapped color and made it existent…he was perhaps the most human of them all and he carried their weaknesses like a cross. But Axel had learned that duality ran thickly in the Nocturnes veins, like waters errant waves, rhythmic and aggressive. Axel wanted, more than ever to rip the flowers from his hand and watch them burn in ash, to hurt Demyx in a way no other action could. "Get away from me."

Demyx laughed. "Silly…you're not supposed to say your wish out loud."

And the pyromaniac knew Demyx wanted to push his buttons…all of them.

Axel stood with violent ease, curbing his destructive urges with little grace. He muttered obscenities, castigated the earth with heated footsteps, trudged farther and deeper into the ocean of petals until the children's cries were silent and he was certain he was alone. For perhaps the first time in this dogmatic existence he felt like he was completely over his head. Alone in a sea of nothingness where his emotions flickered like a breath, dulled and then active, appearing and fading, living and dying…he felt worthless, impotent and frustrated.

Death was a panacea, death was finality, death was his salvation and here he was, back at square one. No walls, no hypocrisy buried beneath moralization like rotting corpses, just infinitum and he felt abandoned. Perhaps he'd been hoping for deliverance, love uninhibited by memory and prejudice. But whatever omnipotent being stood sentinel at the gates of this place was toying with him and he was infuriated …and afraid. Afraid that, perhaps this would be his penalty. That the human in him, the one who'd sought death even as Axel would be punished by being forced to subsist. The irony and cruelty was beyond him at this point.

His fingers curled into his palm and the sharp sting of his own nails reminded him that the obstructive black leather is gone, only a loose fitting black shirt and pants that conform to his body. His nails dig deeper, drawing small rivulets of blood and the air seems bitter and acrid and so very sane. He slowly opens his palm, feeling discomfort when his nails uproot leaving behind angry crescents tinged red and knows his anger has been spent in that one sadistically cathartic act. He sighed before turning to follow the trampled flowers back toward the small patch of land he'd claimed as his and sat in his previous spot as if nothing had ever transpired. The sudden quiet was frustratingly grating and he gazed into the inquisitive gazes of the two boys who, after seeing the heated way in which Axel left, were confused about how to act with this newly emerged awkwardness.

"Stop acting like submissive idiots. I didn't come back to sit with dead fucks so you better goddamn play."

Twin blank stares peered up from the foliage and Axel could feel his left eye twitch.

"What Uncle Axel means is, go have fun." Demyx smiled, trying to ease the bemused expressions on both children's faces. He made a sudden dismissive motion with his hand, hoping to encourage them but Axel was suddenly in his line of vision, petulant turquoise eyes glowering in attempted intimidation. Demyx merely raised an eyebrow, unimpressed by the sudden show of audacity and daring Axel to speak his mind –heaven help them-.

"Stop putting words in my mouth you bastard."

Demyx knew the advantages of control, knew that Axel was simply trying to draw him into a pointless argument for the sake of his own temper but at the moment, he didn't particularly care. Even his patience had an end and he was slowly reaching it.

"They're only children and if you had an ounce of tact, you would realize that you're scaring them with your volatile rampages." He whispered, his tone taking a darker edge, clipped and agitated.

"Yeah well, that's how I detox so deal with it. But if you're so against my rampages then how about giving me something else to take my anger out on?"

"Is that a challenge?"

"What do you think you dumb sh…?"

Whatever Axel's current vein of thought may have been was immediately cut when he saw amused astonishment on the Nocturnes face. He tilted his head to the side in bemusement, caught off guard by the sudden shift in disposition and followed the others gaze, observing two very stationary, very asleep children huddled together as if a potentially hazardous fight were not happening a few feet away.

"Those little…here we are killing each other over their hides and both midgets are asleep."

Demyx laughed, a soundless gesture that caught Axel off guard with how very human it made him appear. Axel shook his head, sighing at how pointless the entire situation was and fell onto his back in utter defeat, his arms wide and listless as he listened to the silence for the first time since his death…for which incarnation didn't seem to matter anymore.

_'When you were born there was only silence and I prayed that it meant you were dead. But you were always rebellious and intolerant and the silence disturbed you. Your whimpers became wails and your wails became anguished cries and I cried in grief as the bells of the old church mourned your welcome. And they still ring just as we still cry…and how I wish you were dead so that I may know silence again.'_

Axel closed his eyes, remembering that particular arc of his life, when Castle Oblivion was a coven composed of two or three secret sects linked by similar hatreds and the foolish belief that a ceasefire would stop any bloodshed between them. It was like playing an intricately dangerous game of chess and their king was always eager to watch his horsemen fail. Axel had taken the role of soldier in this backwards army because soldier was a better derogative than pawn though most days they both meant the same. He lived a life that was somehow better than his last because he could do something about it, because it wasn't a damnation or a curse or a struggle that would eventually fade with death. Still, it wasn't salvation. He wasn't sure whether to be contented with that or not.

He never struggled against it really, the tedium, the stillness, the duplicity. It was the price of renouncing his mortality for the singular second of holding another's existence in his hands and feeling the rush of knowing his decision bordered on sanctimony. That was, until the day he was unceremoniously knocked on his back and told his life _is_ only because the Organization _is. _He realizes now, with veiled amusement, that the Organization is immortal in name only but its members were easily expendable.

He recalls the day he first saw Vexen leave his laboratory, agitation superimposed on his features, a fall from grace for such a graceful being. The Dusks weren't far behind, their movements purposeful and incisive as they scoured the hallways. Axel hadn't cared about the commotion, certain it was one of Vexens infamous tantrums which habitually attracted the Dusk if the anger was violent enough. Until he heard a scream, the first real echo of emotion he'd felt since his days as a human. And he doesn't understand, even now why he chose to follow that sound, why he didn't adhere to Vexens command for him to stop, why he buried his chakram into the inexpressive body of the Dusk, watching as it broke at the seems, the darkness escaping until all he could see was what it had been cornering, a small figure cloaked in white, knees drawn to his chest in a childishly defensive gesture, muffled sobs escaping through the long fingers hiding his face.

"Hey…snap out of it would ya?" Axel snapped, disgusted enough with his inexplicable impulsiveness to go on the offensive.

The sobs slowly faded, overtaken by shuddering breaths as the boys head rose, curiously observing the dark ashes at his feet, the only remnants of the Dusk before slowly looking up…and into Axel's eyes. Axel's heart constricted, a painful reminder that he didn't have enough of a heart to replicate emotions. Prismatic almond shaped eyes, the color of brazen ice that could absorb and reflect a kaleidoscope of blues and violets with each passing expression, with each quivering gulp of air and flicker of tears. So very frail he looked, like a child without its mother, lost and exposed. Was this kid what Vexen was ranting about? If he really was with Vexen then he wouldn't survive long. The scholar liked to take things apart with an apathy that was disturbingly mechanical and it didn't matter that this boy was a living being. In fact, that would only add to the excitement, if he was interesting enough.

_'He's not my problem…he's not in my jurisdiction…hell, I don't even know the brat. So why can't I fucking leave him alone?'_

"Don't let me fade."

Axel blinked, confused at the sudden voice, small and fragmented and so very…real. "Wha…?"

With a childlike boldness the boy gripped the hem of Axel's cloak, his eyes misted with so many forgotten emotions that Axel almost couldn't look him in the eye…almost. But the fear was there, prevalent and mounting rapidly at the sound of incoming footsteps and petulant voices. He panicked, new tears falling from azure eyes as he prayed to Axel, like a sinner to a wayward angel, chanting the same mantra over and over again.

"Don't let me fade."

Axel wasn't an idiot, at least not enough to honestly believe himself virtuous, a savior of the tormented. He was just a shadow of a man or a man who cloaked himself in shadow or some other romanticized shit about human nature that escaped logic. He didn't have the right to exterminate the Dusks, the authority to override Vexen, the _heart_ to protect someone who would die even if he lived. But if there was one thing Axel had infinite possession of it was delusion and he could only blame delusion for forcing him to place his hand over the others, for pulling the boy into his embrace, for muttering so many obscenities and lies.

"I won't."

No, he wasn't an idiot…but it sure seemed to enjoy his company.

The boy he later came to learn was their final member, the Nobody of the Keyblade Master Sora. For Axel, it was hard to imagine that this frail little boy with messy blonde hair and clairvoyant blue eyes could honestly be the emotionless shadow of such a prevailing legend as the Keyblade Master. Harder still to believe that he would one day completely lose his emotions and become another obscurity in the shredded seams of the organization. But it was inevitable, the death which each Nobody endured, the suffusing of numbness and somnolent existence, the fading of the heart and the inexorable weight of human suffering without the pain. Yet Axel couldn't help but stare into those azure eyes and think that it could be different, perhaps he would remain the same, with his warm smile and curious gaze…and it hurt so much more when he realized how little time this boy would remain human.

The boy identified himself as Sora, the only palpable being in his memory whose face was not obscured by darkness. No one had bothered to devise a name for him, too busy in their preparations for the Keyblade Masters arrival to bother with the blonde and his chosen guardian –Axel seemed to be the only one who could approach him and in the end Xenmas allowed it, so long as it kept the blonde pliable and out of the way-. For Axel the new task of guarding the Key of Destiny was one of the most confusing and novel experiences of his life. Each day was infused with some random discovery that seemed so trivial to the pyromaniac and yet made the blonde boy smile in triumph, habitually followed by the pyromaniac's snicker that sounded like a laugh but was more of a scream and Axel never knew how to differentiate anyway.

Most of the time Axel was given assignments far from the rim of Castle Oblivions translucent safeguard and each time he would stay, locked in the boy's room, inventing reports about his intrepid adventure to another world. They were elaborate, poetic and oddly fascinating because the boy was meticulous, to an extent one could not attribute to his nonentity body or human eyes. Axel knew that if this boy had been born instead of made he would have wanted to be a writer for how easily he can analyze Axels eyes and make him believe they really are a color and not just a shade. When the reports are done Axel promptly shuts the blonde up by burning them in the trashcan because no one would believe he wrote them anyhow.

As time progressed inevitability became reality and it was often that Axel would come into the boys room and find a myriad of shards on the floor, bathed in water and wilted flower petals and the boys tears as he sat in the chaos of his own anger, the vase he broke when he realized he couldn't see the flowers blue hues or Axels eyes. The pyromaniac would allow him the small reprieve of tears because tears weren't dyed in prismatic color and maybe the boy could still see them the way Axel could sense them.

Incidents became connected by time until soon there was no way to deny the inescapable. Tantrums had long ago erupted into habitual screaming whenever Sora's memories created distorting ripples in his living world, trespassing forgotten dreams. Slowly the warmth was seeping from his skin, color bleeding from his eyes and dissipating into the bleached white walls. His smiles were morbid, drained, cynically poignant and tragically beautiful…they were him and yet they were Sora and the gap in between had become a crater. And then one night it all came to its culmination, the screaming, the crying, the flash of nameless faces and hidden voices and broken dialogue and too much, too soon. His humanity was fading and Axel could only look on, trying to dismiss the Dusks summoned by the screams and the infringing darkness surrounding their soon to be brother.

Axel couldn't approach him, not with how vigorously the boy would fasten himself to the pyromaniac and murmur incoherent apologies to one of Sora's deepest memories, the boy with silver hair and a heart caught between the zenith of light and darkness. Axel was no longer a singular being in the boys mind, had probably always existed in the others shadow. He knew those eyes couldn't see him anymore, preferred it if it meant he would be allowed to remain without pretension. He remained fixated by the entrance; silent and perceptive, waiting for the silence to finally descend and make the wayward organization of light's discarded complete.

It was then that he heard it, in the aftermath of another yell to the last remnants of sanity that he heard the fragments of song, a vaguely familiar classical piece strung with the nimble fingers of a prodigy's wisdom, notes bold and dominant even as the piece spoke of soft melodies and mournful crescendos. The tune began as a vestige of a forgotten time and its last ideologies to become something unlike the rest, wistful and faintly conscious, a note of remorse and remembrance. It was of betrayal with silence, of loss, broken promises, dreaming and stillness. It was not a melody built to comfort but of awakening from delusion and the boy had stopped screaming, staring at the white washed walls with entranced eyes and Axel had long ago closed his own, trying to discern the notes from the vibrations though both were equally infinite. At last came the final notes, an apology perhaps, a reflection always, a reminder painfully visible.

The pyromaniac didn't need to open his eyes to know that Sora was no longer in the room. He quietly reached for the doorknob, opening the door and observing the random shafts of light as they struck inexpressive ice blue eyes, a sterile mouth, and flaxen hair amid a swarm of Dusks rejoicing in the newly emerged darkness of their master.

"They're waiting Sora."

The boy did not immediately respond, gaze drawn toward the prosthetic light swarming the edges of his room with little aptness, instead moving past him toward the open doorway where more Dusks sat in silence, awaiting his command. His mouth moved but the voice was far away, not in this room, not in this castle, only in Axel's memory.

"My name is Roxas…remember that VIII."

'_Don't let me fade'_

Axel had sacrificed for the chance to see what Roxas could become, though he always knew how it would end. He hadn't wanted to watch Roxas become something as perverse as himself but had been similarly afraid of any other conclusion. In the end though, he doesn't know what Roxas truly was because Nobodies aren't supposed to have such a strong will to live. Maybe Roxas had never been anything like him, like any of them. And that is why he still exists…because he _chose_ to.

"You wanted to know why right? Why I played my sitar as The Key of Destiny discovered the muted silence of oblivion?"

The pyromaniac remained suspended in his own indeterminate reverie, vaguely aware of the question spoken. All the voices seemed to merge together in his mind, some were his, some were hers, some were silent and others overexcited. Few made sense, most were absurd and all of them were scattered, without a face or a name or a time to give them significance. Yet they were so very close, like fingers grappling him to consciousness and he felt…he felt…incomplete.

"Fill in the gaps for me Axel. Resurrect the human you once were so that I can tell you of the humanity I helped destroy. An eye for an eye…"

"Leaves us both bleeding." Axel completed, having heard the phrase

"It's only fitting."

"…"

"Don't be afraid to feel Axel. That's the first step to leaving this place…return to yourself, look within your mind, search for your heart, and feel the memories when you do."

His fingers curl into the earth and he can vaguely feel the discomfort of soil under his nails. Lives are gold or so he's heard but they tarnish too quickly and crumble with derisive ease. He harbors no shame in admitting he's watched lives collapse and knows he's aided most of them in their self-destruction. He's destroyed memories with fire and drawn stars with blood and he thinks it shouldn't be this easy to remember that he wasn't always called Axel, that he didn't always have red hair and red fire and black blood. It shouldn't be as simple as it is but he knows life is anything but simple and it has come at its price.

"Once upon a time…" His tongue darts out of his mouth to taste something like nostalgia but it was artificial and fleeting. He licks his lips in afterthought, mouths something like a prayer but Demyx doesn't understand the dialect and continues his allegory with spiteful happiness. "…a man defied his God by raping and occasionally killing young girls with black hair similar to his own. No one knows if there was ever a connection between the murders and his family for everyone rumored about the closeness between the man and his mother, abnormal and disturbing as it was. One of the victims, the daughter of the towns florist was discovered to be pregnant with the mans bastard child, an unholy being to be sure. Nine months later it was born, a boy with the same wild raven hair as his father and the same prophesized heterodoxy. He was marked in the same fashion as the towns other heretics, one black mark beneath each eye, their eternal cry for repentance of the cursed children of man."

"Figures you couldn't have simply had a fetish for pain or a drunken mistake. Always given to the dramatic huh?" Demyx comments wryly, surprising the pyromaniac when he traces the black tattoos impressed into his skin with unanticipated gentleness. Axel thinks that the action is one of understanding, perhaps even acceptance but decides not to speculate further. His fingers withdraw, coming to rest on his lap as the Nocturne patiently waits for the other to continue. Axel blinks owlishly; having never felt another's touch on his intimate marks, not even Roxas but the boy had never been much for intimate contact even when he was still human. Only when the silence has become uncomfortable does Axel cough, mumbling something about interruptions and stupidity and roughly hitting Demyx in the back of the head, much to the Nocturne's confusion.

"Shut your yap and stop butting in. You want me to keep going or not?"

Not really a question and it isn't phrased as one. When Demyx doesn't respond Axel takes it as his queue to continue.

"I grew up in my father's shadow, always the murderer's son, the bastard child, the heretic but never Axel the obedient, Axel the intellectual, Axel the person. No one could look past my bloodline, too absorbed by their bigotry and the divisive line created by beliefs and ethics. My mother too was persecuted because she had chosen to give birth to a defiled infant though the choice had never honestly been hers to begin with. It was a sinful failing to abort a child, regardless of the circumstance and religion had a firm hold on the small, isolated parish where we lived. And so we lived, my mother and I on the outskirts of the forest where she could hide her indignity and her shame."

"By my eighteenth birthday I'd already dropped out of school and joined a gang composed of the towns other exiles. We were family in a way, thicker and stronger than the blood of those who were forced to take care of us. The exiles weren't simply an amassing of convicts bastard children. Some were kids born with illnesses, most of which weren't known during our time and came to be branded as divine punishment by the superstitious. It was like a fucking circus and we were the freaks. It only got worse when the rumors began. Corpses near the river, two children, siblings. There was no blood, no sign of struggle. It wasn't uncommon for people to underestimate the rivers current and be dragged down into the precipice but the old women simply loved to gossip about how, nearly twenty years ago a man had killed two sisters by drowning them in the river. See a connection?" Axel asked with a sudden pause, watching as Demyx bit his lip in thought before realization made him start.

"Your father?"

"Bingo. Even in the grave the fucker found a way to screw me over. It didn't help when other bodies began to show up, dead without injury. The rumors began to spread, about how most of the corpses found were children…too much of a coincidence. Guess I really can't blame them. I wasn't exactly challenging my father's infamy. I've seen how desperate humans can become when they're threatened and I must've seemed like one big ass threat to have racked up that many corpses. The rest was unavoidable." Axel murmured with finality, as if the incident itself had been predestined, manifestly fated. He suddenly smiled, startling Demyx with how playful, how false it truly was. The humor did not reach Axel's eyes.

"They formed an angry horde, assaulted our house and killed my mother for standing in their way. It was kinda funny really. The old bitch had never told me she loved, never touched me but she defended me like I _meant_ something to her. Then all that was left was me and I didn't stand a chance against an entire mob of fearful villagers. Should have been the end, almost was until I realized the shadows were talking to me. Thought I was out of my mind, that the blood loss was finally getting to me. Turns out though it wasn't just me. The shadows really were moving, whispering softly during my final breaths. It was the Heartless. "

Abruptly he stopped, eyes closing of their own volition. Demyx noticed the slight grimace creasing the skin between Axel's eyes and remained immobile, knowing the other is searching his mind for the right words to express himself.

"I don't really…remember dying. There are fragments of memory here and there but too many of them are covered in darkness. All I can remember is a voice…a profound echo, the only thing keeping me from complete obscurity. It asked me if I wanted to live. Live for all the things denied to me. Live for hedonism, anarchy, revenge. Live as a choice and not a consequence. And I did want to live…I wanted retribution for their inability to accept us, for creating misanthropists from naïve children, for seeing my father instead of me. When I woke up I was this." he made a sweeping motion over his face, emphasizing his observation. "That night the Heartless raided the village, capturing its residents and transporting them into the local church. Imagine their surprise at seeing me, so different with flame red hair but my eyes were the same, my tattoos were the same. I think I played around with them, allowing the Heartless to take the children quickly. It was the adults I locked inside the church, watching them burn alive with their precious doctrines and bigotry, with their angelic murals and mosaic glass windows. By morning the Heartless had all gone, in search of a new breeding ground and the Nobodies had already tracked me down. The rest was history."

"…The end." Axel adds with sardonic humor, filling in the rapidly growing silence between himself and Demyx. He felt the vertigo, never having recalled so much so quickly, or spoken them so openly. For a second he feels insecure, exposed and weak, wondering why he bothered to tell the Nocturne these things. Why, for an answer to a question that is no longer relevant, inconsequential at best. But the song…even now he can hear it, haunting him. The only passionate melody Demyx has ever played, the only thing potent enough to awaken Roxas from the world of the dead. There had to have been some connotation behind it, something left unsaid. He wants to know if what he felt was genuine…if what Demyx conveyed was true…

So caught up in his thoughts the pyromaniac doesn't notice the sudden change in the Nocturnes gaze, the dimming of his azure eyes or the loss of his indulgent smile. With easy grace Demyx moves from his position beside Axel, kneeling in front of him. He ignores quizzical turquoise eyes, placing both palms on Axel's shoulders and pushing him onto his back, straddling the others waist.

"Damn it, are you coming out of the closet NOW of all times?" Axel asks with surprising composure, nearly but not quite overshadowing the apprehension there as well. Demyx chuckled lightly, placing both hands over Axel's eyes in an effort to hide his disquieting gaze, perceptive and probing.

"Don't look at me like that."

Calloused palms encircled his wrists like a vice, a subconscious attempt to remove his hands or perhaps keep them in place. There is the unsettling thought that the touch is a supplication, that he has become the pyromaniac's anchorage to reality for the greatest truths are found in the darkness. He can feel Axel's thumb skim his wrist, tracing the veins to land directly above the pulse point, the only existent attestation that he is alive.

"Like what?"

"Like I'll destroy you."

"Won't you?"

Demyx laughed and it was so repulsively false that even he felt nauseated by it. Slowly he leaned down, placing his forehead on the backs of his hands, the only barrier between the two.

"Sometimes, I don't know who is the bigger idiot. You for thinking you have something to lose or me for thinking I have nothing to gain. Why would I destroy you, because you've given me your memories? Don't be stupid. If I held that much power over you wouldn't you have destroyed me already? Face it; our memories are disposable, fucking useless. That's why Nobodies are allowed to keep them. They're like a spiders coil, skeletal, beautiful and deadly but so aesthetic they predictably rupture. But it's all we have left Axel. And if you don't leave your mark with them then it's like you never existed and that fucking scares me…"

Axel felt the palpable tremor of the body above him, listened to the heartbeat so close to his own and felt as if he were speaking to an apparition from his past, created to be his punishment.

"You're just like him you know. When his memories began to reappear he was afraid of losing himself to them, of forgetting and being forgotten. When a Nobody has nothing he doesn't concern himself with death. He has lived for nothing and he will die for nothing and it will all equal exactly the same thing. But he was given something to live for and that scared him. He wanted to find those people in his memory, to become part of their living world, to be told he _had_ a home and people who called _him_ home. Is that what you're looking for Demyx? Someone to remember you?"

"You might be giving me too much credit Axel." A smile through the darkness, painted with bravado and candor. Axel could trace it with his memory having seen so many before. All of them artificial, perhaps their greatest appeal.

"No…I think I'm giving you enough. It's you who pretended you were too stupid to warrant it. You're just as much of a manipulator as I am Demyx. Worse because you could hide it so well. But you haven't answered my question. You told me not to be afraid to remember. Now I want you to do the same. I'm the thorn in your memory, now you'll be the thorn in my ass. Sound fair?"

"Since when have you been fair?"

"You want me to listen or not?"

There was a long pause in which the shift of leaves meant as much to him as the complete destruction of an entire world for all he could perceive. He felt Demyx shift, sit up to straddle his waist again and wondered if the Nocturne found their position just a bit awkward/weird/perverse/disturbing/arousing and decided he didn't particularly care at this point. Inhibitions meant little in death and had done nothing but corrode his existence during his years with the living. Still, so long as all hands were accounted for, he wouldn't protest.

"There had been war for as far as I could remember. Political factions vying for power after the fall of the last monarch, some king who'd been assassinated when he decided he was tired of being an ineffective figurehead and instead tried to institute his dogmatic ideology."

"Wrong move." Axel murmured with hinted sarcasm, his hand replicating a gun which he nimbly pressed to his temple before clicking his tongue for added effect. Demyx nodded his head in agreement.

"Famous last words." Demyx added in afterthought before shaking his head, deciding to continue. "At the time I lived in a convent inhabiting a town under the former king's rule. I was seventeen, having lived my entire life under the edification of the nuns with my sister, the only other sibling from my father's first marriage. Once we discovered the failing of the monarch we knew what would happen. Purges, raiding, the complete obliteration of established morals. The town's residents began to flee as news of the advancing armies reached us. It was chaos. Day after day, night after night the train whistle would chime louder than the church bells, carrying refugees to protected domains to the east. The convents residents, most of them students became fewer in number as their parents came to pick them up. Soon, all that was left were the nuns, my sister and I. The nuns wouldn't leave for they believed in the former king's way of life and chose to stand behind that held belief under the protection of their God."

"And you?"

"Me? I had nowhere to go really. My father had cast my sister and me away when he remarried. His wife couldn't stand to see us. We both knew he wouldn't come back to get us so he wasn't a viable escape plan. The nuns couldn't help us either. Monetary systems had crumbled and only those with enough resources could escape. We were trapped in that small village. During that time our schooling was cancelled. What was the point in teaching only two children? So we had free time to do what we wanted. I remembered my sister had wanted a garden, like our mother had when we were young. She yearned for something to make our prison a home instead of four secular walls and for the remainder of our time we were outside, planting and weeding and waiting for spring, the time of gardens."

"I guess you could say our garden became our obsession. With nothing more to look forward to we only had that small patch of land and it kept us occupied. Little grew but what did made us so absurdly happy. Looking at it now I guess we were trying to live our lives like we knew we never would. A man, a woman and their home, a future we were reared to want. I guess that type of exploration, the confusion of roles and lives and want and needs…it led to inevitabilities."

The current had shifted, sending wisps of petals to rain over them with flagrant grace. Axel could sense the sudden tightening of the others hands, as if trying to push him into the earth below, drown him in the darkness of his hands. Axel tightened his own grip on the others arms, an awakening from whatever reverie had captured the Nocturnes mind. With measured slowness hands fell away, leaving the wind to wash over the warm skin. Axel opened his eyes, wincing at the sudden light blurring his vision. A few blinks later images have focused, his gaze coming to rest on the others averted eyes. Axel gave an exasperated sigh, cupping the others chin and forcing their gazes to meet.

"Being a coward? I thought you'd moved past that."

Demyx smiled, a bitter upturn of lips. "Old habits die hard."

"Are you ashamed then? Of your memories?"

Demyx shook his head, moving away from Axel's tentative touch. With an almost impulsive inattention the Nocturne threw his head back, staring into the everlasting void of the pallid sky. He spoke, low and careful so that his words were peppered with the wind and absorbed by the sky.

"Don't misunderstand. I've never felt ashamed of my past. Of anything I've done. Not of her, never of her. Only of myself for being so straightforward, so unthinking, given to impulse, hedonism and obliviousness. If I had thought of tomorrow instead of the moment I could have given her something so much more deserving of her than I was."

Demyx smiled into the emptiness, though his fingers clung desperately to Axel's shirt, something to keep him grounded amid the waves of nostalgia.

"Do you know Axel that loving your sister is considered God's gift, equilibrium between the heart and mind? And yet to lie with her, as a man would with a woman, to feel carnal pleasure from that union is a travesty? We are taught to love and yet it is a discriminating emotion. For loving my sister, for loving her as a man and not her brother…that I will never be ashamed of. We may never have been meant as soul mates but we were familiar, safe, a haven. Partners in life and in death."

"When the army gathered beyond the convents walls she held my hand as she had always done and she sang to me, through the gunfire and the screams she held me close, and in her final moments she whispered her love to me, choosing to die for me, with me, like me. And like you I heard the shadows speak, accepted their proffer and awoke as the Melodious Nocturne. I flooded the village with water and blood, watching our Grecian flowers fall, absorbing our sins like the sunken moon."

Slowly he leaned down until his breath ghosted over the cartilage of Axel's ear, his words calm and haunting, patient and soft. "Roxas was like her ghost. The way his humanity teetered on a string of desire and morality. His eyes that looked past the sky and saw something more than what was offered, promises kept and lost, dreams on flourishing stems, colors in prisms of memory. I played my sitar with its brass tacks and coffin nails because to watch the warmth fade from his body was to watch it fade from hers. I was selfish I'll admit it. I couldn't watch it again; feel like I was losing her again. I played for her memory even if it meant purging Roxas of his. Do you hate me then, for declaring my love to him, even when he was just her shadow? Do you think less of me for lying with my sister in my own depravity instead of Gods?"

Turquoise eyes blinked owlishly, staring with bemused absorption at the children so close to them, having recently awakened and gazing unperturbedly at their makeshift guardians. Its can be left to his oblivious nature, the fact that he never truly noticed the boys incandescent eyes, varying shades of blue reflecting each other like polar equivalents or how one pair of eyes remained constantly hidden beneath blonde hair, as if hiding from the world or rather, protecting himself from it.

He can't think of words to say when Demyx stands, the small raven haired child mirroring his actions with apparent relief. There is a silent message between both children, a shared consciousness of what has happened. With candid ease the raven haired boy holds out his hand, pinkie extended and the other mirrors the action until both fingers are intertwined, a promise of something beyond them both. Wordlessly the Nocturne summons the boy forward and the boy complied, rushing toward him with the discretion of a wild stallion. Axel instantly recognizes his azure eyes, the same ones that clung to him affectionately during Axel's occasion with Luxord and knit his hair with ribbons when they were alone. The boy pauses briefly, smiling with a ghost of familiarity that makes him feel like a fool. He stared at the boy who is not really a child and at the man who is more boy than shadows and can see them for what they really are.

He can say it now…he is a fool but that's human isn't it? Odd how he doesn't fear the weakness as much as before. With a sigh that slowly transcends into a smirk he closed his eyes, feeling unchained for the first time in a long time. Perhaps he's had it wrong all along. It not wholly about forgiving yourself; it's about acceptance _of _yourself, even without forgiveness, even with flaws. It's not just finding yourself but wanting to be found. It's not about burying your past but reclaiming it. It's not about recalling your memories but remembering that their end has given you a new beginning. It's returning to who you were and knowing the person you were yesterday is not the person you are today and you're better or worse for it. In the end, it's all about the beginning. It's about coming full circle and realizing it's never too late for gardens or poker games or innocence.

"No idiot, I don't think less of you for anything you've done. I don't care about it, its stupid and so are you for thinking I would. That was yesterday's version of you and he's gone and buried. I'm only interested in today's, the guy who met me and remembers me always. Understand?"

There is a laugh, a true, honest laugh that sounds part shadow and part child and then its gone, flickering into dormancy for the last time. When Axel opens his eyes he is alone again, all save for the blonde haired boy who has come near him, standing next to his legs with uncertainty.

"Hey kid? What's your name?"

The boy jumps slightly, seemingly afraid of being addressed without the shield of another being close by. Axel isn't sure whether to laugh or roll his eyes but does neither, instead standing up and subconsciously wiping away the grass and earth clinging to this clothes. Playfully, he flicks the boys nose, earning him a glare that's better than the deadpan expression before and asks the question again, not that he really needs to know. The boy responded with arrogant smugness, false bravado to cover up the awkwardness of the entire situation and begins to follow the pyromaniac when he makes his way toward the light both can see, where the voices are calling.

_Hey Axel, you never come visit me anymore…smooch…have you forgotten me already?_

"Of course not…measurements 36, 25, 34…I'll remember you the next time I'm in the neighborhood Larxene."

_Still a bumbling idiot I see…that our destinies were so deeply interwoven…no wonder we failed._

"Chill Vex…enjoy the afterlife would ya? It'll do wonders for your disposition…if you have any."

_Axel? You think we could be friends in the next life?_

"The way karma's been going, probably. But we remember each other right Demy? Next time though, I'm topping."

_…Axel?_

"Yeah?"

_Where are you going?_

"I don't know but its damn bright. It's warm though…really warm. It feels like home."

_Sounds nice…think I could come visit you sometime?_

"Sure but this time, _you_ have to come find _me_."

_Lazy bum, always slacking off…fine but you better remember me or I'll make you pay. Hey Axel?_

"Hmm?"

_What does it feel like…to be reborn?_

"That's easy…like finding your light at the end of the tunnel. Like being complete."

_It really is like home then._

"Whatever that means."

_Hahaha…_

"You laughed."

_So did you._

"Guess we have changed huh?"

_Is that a good thing?_

"Yeah. Means were not the same people we were yesterday."

_You say the weirdest things._

"I prefer the term original thank you kindly."

_Are you alone?_

"Nah, I got the others, you and the kid."

_A kid? What's his name?_

"Take a guess…starts with an A…"

_So you've found the pieces of yourself, your heart. But then again, you've always had one right?_

"Hey, don't confuse us kid…I'm the vicious pyromaniac. You were the squirt."

_Axel!_

"Still can't take a joke."

_I can't hear your voice anymore…are you leaving?_

"... I can't believe how clear it is…It's so clear."

_What's clear?_

The boy grasped Axel's hand gently, allowing himself to be lost in the infinite light with this, his guardian, his memory, his other half. And it felt like, for once he didn't have to hide his face or the tattoos beneath his eyes. The light accepted both equally. The pyromaniac turned to regard the child, already fading like sand through his fingers. And if felt like it was finally alright to go to sleep. A small voice called to the last remnants of his consciousness, his awareness and he smiled as he heard the beat of a heart and realized it was his own.

"I'll tell you when I wake up Roxas."

_That's not the beginning of the end  
That's the return to yourself  
The return to innocence_

_Don't care what people say  
Follow just your own way  
Follow just your own way  
Don't give up, don't give up  
To return, to return to innocence.  
If you want then laugh  
If you must then cry  
Be yourself don't hide  
Just believe in destiny_

* * *

In case my writing skills didn't convey it (which is a strong possibility) the children were in fact their hearts, waiting for each of them so that they could be reincaranted. (sighs) It seemed like a good idea at the time but..(shrugs)...oh well.

That's it for this...here's hoping that those few brave souls who survived please be kind enough to leave a review and tell me what they think. Constructive criticism is appreciated. Thank you for reading. Peace and happy writing!


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